


Hey They've Both Died Once

by amtrak12



Category: Warehouse 13
Genre: Gen, artifact retrieval, background Bering and Wells
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-09
Updated: 2014-04-09
Packaged: 2018-01-18 17:34:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,462
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1436854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amtrak12/pseuds/amtrak12
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve is assigned H.G.'s first case back at the warehouse. He doesn't understand everyone's concerns, but that doesn't prevent him from helping to ease the tension.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Hey They've Both Died Once

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kathryne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kathryne/gifts).



> Don't ask me about the title okay. I really have no idea. :S

"Hey, I got a case for you," Claudia greeted him as he climbed up the stairs.

"Finally." Steve had hoped that was the reason Artie had called everyone back to the office. It'd only been a week since his last field assignment, but he still felt restless. There were only so many hours of inventory he could do in a row before he itched to leave.

"I know, right? Weird things going on in Oregon. Kids rebelling against their parents, citizens rioting against the mayor - it's like Small Towns Gone Wild. Artie wants you to check it out."

Steve tilted his head. "Hang on. You keep saying you not us."

Claudia smiled. "Such astute. Much proud." Steve rolled his eyes. "Yeah, you're in for a treat." She patted his arm. "This assignment comes with a special partner." She spun around to head into the office without explaining further.

Uh oh. Steve followed her. Why was he getting a special partner for this case? What did special even mean?

"There isn't some initiative to replace agents with robots is there? Because I'm not being a guinea pig again."

"Don't be ridiculous. The warehouse will never be that technologically up to date. I'm not a miracle worker." She halted in the doorway and looked at him. "And if I was, I swear on my record collection that I'd use the robots to automate paperwork, not retrievals."

"Then, I wish you were a miracle worker."

"You and me both, buddy."

"Ah, there you are," Artie said as they entered the room. The other team members had beaten them there, H.G. looking way more comfortable than he'd been at three weeks into the job. But then, this was her third week back at the warehouse, not third week ever.

Artie reached for some files on his desk. "We've got a ping."

"Yeah, in Oregon. Something about riots?" Steve replied.

"Yes." Artie narrowed his eyes at Claudia who shrugged.

"What? I had to motivate him to get a move on."

"I was already on my way up."

"Well, fine," Artie said. "Since you're already filled in, here's the file. There's H.G. Go. Find the artifact."

"Say what now?" Pete asked. H.G.'s brow rose, and Steve glanced at Claudia who was grinning and bouncing as much as she does each year when the Christmas decorations go up. So, that's what she'd   
meant by special.

"Is there a problem?" Artie asked.

"You're sending Jinksy out for H.G.'s first case?"

"Yes, I am." Artie crossed his arms. Steve wondered how he'd gotten the case instead of Claudia. Wasn't one of the perks of being caretaker-in-training getting commandeer cases that let you work   
with your idol? (Claudia had never called H.G. her idol, but he'd heard the story of the time machine at least a dozen times since H.G.'s return. He could put the pieces together.)

"But he doesn't have any experience with her," Pete continued to protest.

"Experience?" H.G. said. "it's not as if I need a handler."

"No, I know. I'm just saying you guys aren't used to working together." Pete looked at Artie. "Why don't you send someone who knows H.G. out with her? Like us." He pointed between him and Myka.

"Because I don't need three agents working one retrieval," Artie said. "And in this case, it might be better that Steve's never worked with H.G. before. No baggage. Less chance for blow-ups in the   
field."

The remark seemed pointed to Pete, but Steve noticed H.G.'s eyes drift down as if she was being rebuked.

"Hey, H.G. and I are pals now," Pete said. "Aren't we, H.G.?" He tapped her on the elbow, and H.G. frowned.

"Did you just touch me?"

"See? Totally pals."

"Pete, they'll be fine," Myka said. "Won't you guys?"

Steve was startled that she looked at him as she asked. He didn't know why she'd think he wouldn't be okay with working with H.G. "Yeah. I'm, I'm fine." Why was everyone making this a big deal? He glanced at Claudia who still seemed generally upbeat. She met his glance with a smile.

"You're good?"

"Since I wasn't the one arguing, yes."

"Good," Arite said. "Then, if everyone's done wasting time, you two get going. He waved off Steve and H.G. and then turned to stop Pete as he headed back out to the floor. "And you and Myka can work on that stack of paperwork over there you've been putting off." Pete threw his head back and groaned.

"Can't I just call my mom and tell her everything? It'd be faster."

"No, because these reports are for the regents, not your mother."

"But my mom's one of the regents."

Steve followed H.G. into the umbilicus and caught sight of Myka's stare as they left. He couldn't read it, but he tried smiling to put her at ease. The door swung shut and cut him off. He wasn't sure it would've helped anyway. He didn't understand the problem. So he had never worked with H.G. before? Everyone always had a first case together. No one jumped in already knowing each other.

But Artie selecting him specifically to work with H.G. because they didn't have any "baggage" bothered him. Did Artie mean Steve hadn't been around when H.G. tried to trigger a super volcano? Because no, he hadn't been around then, but he also thought everyone had long since forgiven and healed and moved on and that's why H.G. was back. So it was a non-issue, right? Especially after her help with the astrolabe. But then where did all this tension come from?

No, no. He was over-thinking it. Claudia had clearly had some say in the arrangement or at least whole-heartedly approved of it, and she wouldn't have used baggage as a reason. Artie had probably just said it as an excuse to stop Pete's arguing.

"It was me they were calling into question in there," H.G. said. "Not you or your capabilities."

"What?" How did she know he was dwelling on things? He had a poker face. He had a _good_ poker face.

"They can't forget I've ran away once or twice. They're worried what I might do when I'm back in the field." She tossed him a smile. "You needn't worry, though. I am neither unstable nor evil at the moment. Everything should go fine."

"Okay." This conversation was very strange and not nearly as comforting as H.G. seemed to think it (though she wasn't lying, so at least it didn't make him feel more uncomfortable). Steve decided to steer the conversation to a safer topic as they walked outside.

"So, do you want to drive or should I?" Actually, this may not be a safer topic because Claudia could be downright ruthless to gain driving rights, and, as far as he could tell, Pete and Myka constantly fought back and forth over who drove. But at least driving was a normal dangerous discussion around here, one he knew how to navigate.

"Well, it is your car. Seems only natural you be the one to drive." H.G. pointed. "I could look over the file along the way."

"Uh, yeah. Sure." He gave her the case file and pulled out his car keys. That was unexpectedly easy. Maybe the early tension and awkwardness wouldn't matter. Maybe this case would run as smoothly as   
the New Orleans trumpet case with Myka (even if there wasn't any jazz this time). Steve hid a smirk as he ducked around to the driver's side of his car. Claudia would've groaned at him for that one, but she wasn't here.

////////////////////////////

"This doesn't seem to be a riot anymore."

Steve stepped into the room and took in the chattering crowd. There were rows of chairs arranged to face a podium. A woman stood behind the podium, banging a gavel and shouting for order. No one settled down.

"Yeah, I'd say it's more a disorderly gathering." He stopped a passing girl. "Hey, I'm sorry. What meeting is starting now?"

"It's not starting. It's been going on for a while. It's the emergency town meeting." The teen narrowed her eyes and looked him and H.G. over. "You're out-of-towners."

"Uh, yeah, we are. We're government agents sent in to investigate the riots here." He flashed his ATF badge and hoped the girl wouldn't think it's weird that the ATF was investigating riots. Or panic.

She didn't. Instead the girl switched into a full on glare. "We haven't had any riots here. And who sent you? Why would we need outside agents to sort this out? No one's burning any buildings down."

"Umm," Steve was out. He probably shouldn't have led with government agents.

H.G. stepped forward. "Could you help explain what has been happening here? An emergency town meeting isn't usually called at random."

The girl shrugged. "It's just the parents freaking out because some of the kids aren't wanting to play basketball anymore. My brother walked out of practice the other day to go play in the leaves. I mean, he's nine. You can't make him play basketball if he doesn't want to."

Steve and H.G. looked at each other. That fell in with the reports of children rebelling at least.

"Did any of the other kids walk out of practice?" Steve asked.

The girl shrugged. "I don't know. I wasn't there."

"Are those all parents of the basketball team?" H.G. asked.

"No. This is a town meeting, not a pee wee basketball meeting." The girl shifted her foot a half-step back. "Look join the meeting if you want, but no one's rioting. No one needs the National Guard or whatever coming in here and messing things up, but whatever. No one listens to me anyway." She walked away from the meeting and out of the room.

"We're not the National Guard." Where'd she get that idea? The National Guard didn't carry around ATF badges.

He turned back and found H.G. studying him. "I suppose your haircut is a bit military."

Steve frowned and raised a hand up to check his head. "It's just my hair."

A faint smile appeared on H.G. "Shall we see what all this ruckus is about?"

"Yeah," Steve said with a final rub of his head. The Farnsworth began buzzing. "Or not." He pulled the Farnsworth from his jacket pocket and flipped it open. "Hello?"

Pete's face grinned at him through the screen. "Hey, Jinksy. How's it going?"

"Well, someone decided I look military enough for the National Guard, so."

"Pft! Lame-o. The National Guard isn't military. They're like the JV team. Or the pep squad."

"I’ll be sure to tell my cousin that," Steve said, prompting Pete to wince and give a quiet ‘oops’. "So, what's up?" It was early for anyone to be calling for an update.

"Nothing," Pete said. "Just calling to see how it's going."

H.G. sighed and stepped away. Steve had the same suspicion.

"Are you checking up on us?"

"Uh, no. I'm just, you know, saying hi."

The small Farnsworth screen made reading lies more difficult, but not impossible. "Are you checking in on H.G.?"

"What? No. I'm not checking in on anyone. Myka was the one who was too chicken to open up the Farnsworth."

"No! No, I did not tell him to call you!" Pete's image jostled as Myka (Steve presumed) wrestled him for the Farnsworth. There was some mumbled verbal fighting as well, though Steve couldn't make a   
lot of it out.

Pete regained control and the screen evened out. "Okay, I'm sorry. I'm just bored. It's all brown walls and brown shelves and brown boxes and people keep gooing me."

"The artifacts aren't toys," came Myka's voice. Pete rolled his eyes and made the 'ugh' face of a ten year old. Two years in, and Steve still hadn't wrapped his head around Pete's odd mix of childish antics and professional competence. How did Myka do it?

The screen shifted again and became focused on Myka. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry, I didn't mean for him to bug you guys."

H.G. drifted back to his side as Steve shrugged. "It's cool. But if he's really bored, tell him to call back in a few hours. Maybe he'll get lucky and we'll be in the middle of a chase for him."

"Ooo, negative, negative." Pete's face crowded Myka's on the screen. "Never run and... Farnsworth. You will smack your head on a beam you were supposed to be ducking. I'm speaking from personal experience on this."

"Of course you are," H.G. said under her breath. Pete didn't react, and Steve hoped that meant he hadn't heard.

"Okay, well if you don't actually want anything from us, we should really start tracking down this artifact."

"Yeah, we'll let you work," Myka said. "Sorry again."

"You kids have fun," Pete said. "Oh hey." His eyes narrowed and he pointed two fingers at the screen. "Neither one of you die."

"Already been there and gotten the t-shirt." Pete nodded in appreciation. "Bye." Steve hung up the Farnsworth.

H.G. had her head tilted at him. "T-shirt?"

"What?"

"You got a t-shirt for dying?"

"Actually no." Steve frowned. "Apparently a few years back, Claudia made t-shirts for everyone that showed an artifact that had almost killed each of them, but she never made me a shirt for actually dying. I feel like I got ripped off. I should complain to her about that." He didn't really want a shirt, so he probably wouldn't bring it up to her later. But it would've been a fun conversation to have if she had been there just then.

H.G. continued to look baffled. "Then, why did you mention a shirt?"

"Um, it was just a joke." Still confusion. "It's a saying: been there, done that, got the t-shirt?"

"Ah," H.G. nodded once. "I see."

"You don't have that saying in Britain?"

"Perhaps, but not when I was there."

It took Steve a moment. "Oh! H.G. Wells, eighteen hundreds, right." He shook his head at himself.

H.G. blinked at him, a smile peeking out again. "Did you honestly forget that?"

"Maybe. Kind of." He winced.

H.G. shook her head. "Incredible."

Steve still winced. "Can I still use the new guy card in my defense even if you're technically newer than me?"

"You know I was recruited to the warehouse in eighteen eighty-eight." H.G. crossed her arms.

Well, okay. "So, then I definitely get to use the new guy card, right?"

A small laugh escaped H.G. She tilted her head towards the quieting town meeting. "Shall we start investigating?"

"Yep, yep. Let's, let's do that." Steve followed her into the crowd.

//////////////////////////

"Half the kids started up their own scrimmage game instead of running lay-ups. They were making up their own rules and plays and wouldn't listen to me."

/

"And she kept derailing the class. Wouldn't stop asking about fruit trees when we were trying to plant carrots."

/

"Finally, some police support. This entire place is in anarchy. People going behind my back and changing the schedules. They say they negotiate with the other parties, but that's not how it works. The gym is booked on a first come, first serve basis and it has to go through me. You need to tell them. Through me, I organize the schedules."

/

"Anarchy? Yes, have you seen this place? Total chaos. Half of them think there's something in the water, the other half think it's just the kids acting out and are trying to blame the teachers." The mayor who'd been trying to control the town meeting sighed. "I used to be a teacher in this town, third grade. I guarantee you, no one is teaching the kids to ignore their parents and coaches."

"But it's not just the kids, right?" Steve said, "Some adults have been affected, too."

"Yes, and don't say that too loud. You'll give fuel to the water idea." The mayor checked around, but the meeting had slipped back into in-fighting. "Look, I don't know what's going on. Reports are scattered. Some events run smoothly. Others don't. The kids listen at home, and at school, so I can't explain why certain sports practices don't go well. I'd say it's just the pee wee kids being young, but the fifth and sixth grade teams have had some trouble as well."

"Is there any common factor with these bad practices? Are the kids visiting the same place beforehand? Watching the same thing? Wearing something specific?"

"I don't know. I've only been hearing about this for a few days, and people don't give many details when they're upset. All I know is there's been three bad basketball practices, one game that had to be canceled, two community classes disrupted, and a youth group party that somehow caused property damage." The mayor leaned in closer. "No party has ever caused property damage here."

"Wait," Steve glanced at the room. "Were all these events all here?"

"Not in this room, no. The gym is on the other side of the building."

"But they were all here in the community center?"

"Maybe. Most of them, for sure. Does that matter?"

"Maybe," Steve said.

/

H.G. had discovered similar results with her interviews.

"There must be something here that's affecting people."

"And only here if everything goes back to normal outside the community center."

"Might be an artifact that only activates when someone's in proximity," H.G. said, "for it to have temporary effects."

"So they wouldn't even have to touch it?" Steve asked. "Well, that explains classrooms upstairs and the gym and cafeteria down here being affected, I guess. Doesn't help much in finding the artifact."

"We need to know what's new here. It has to be a recent change."

Steve took in a deep breath. "Time for round two."

/////////////////////////////

Another forty minutes of questions and half-angry/half-frustrated responses and they wound up here, staring at a wall. Steve didn't believe the wall was the artifact, but it was apparently the only new thing in the building. There hadn't even been new chairs or sports equipment brought in in about a decade, the townspeople insisted. The only recent change was this wall.

Steve squinted and examined the span of memorial bricks before him. Now what?

The Farnsworth buzzed.

Steve flipped it open. "Hello?" He looked down at the screen. "Oh, hey Artie." He'd thought it'd been Pete again.

"Give me an update."

Of course Artie wouldn't say hello back. "Well, we've narrowed the problem down to the community center, but the only new thing here is some construction they did to widen the gym area for more bleachers. They finished redoing an entire wall just last week which coincides with the start of the rebelling problems. Haven't found the artifact, though."

"Hmm, construction work could've disturbed something in the existing walls or in the ground. Or maybe someone buried something during the work. Do you have any details on the artifact itself?"

"H.G. thinks it's triggered by proximity since the effects seem temporary and contained to this building."

"Proximity. Could be, could be. I'll do some digging into the town and see if anything pops up."

"Okay." Artie stayed on the line. It was weird not to see the screen go black the moment he stopped talking. "Is there anything else?"

"So, H.G.'s doing fine? Working well on the case? Doesn't seem distracted?"

Everyone. Everyone was calling about her. "I don't really know what you're asking, Artie."

Artie made some hedging and grumbling noises. "Is she focused on the case? Nothing's interfering with her work?"

"Not at the moment, but that's because she's on the other side of the room and can't hear you right now," Steve said.

"Hmm, alright, good. Call when you learn more" There's Artie's trademark hang-up. Steve closed the now-dark Farnsworth and put it back in his pocket. Had Artie and the team been as worried about him after he came back to life? Or when Myka rejoined the warehouse? Steve couldn't remember. Everything was too new for him back when Myka came back, and he'd been a bit wrapped up in his own worries over the metronome to really notice anyone else's. Maybe the check-ins were normal after someone left and came back to the warehouse. Maybe everyone's anxiousness had nothing to do with H.G specifically.

"Have you found anything?"

Steve turned around to find H.G. now standing next to him. He shook his head. "Nothing's standing out. Artie just called. He thought maybe the construction disturbed something that was already in the building."

"Could have," H.G. said, but her eyes darted over the new like she was still looking for something.

"What are you thinking?"

"The effects, they're very strange and inconsistent. The children on the basketball team all reacted differently, and it wasn't nearly as rebellious as the parents claimed. I spoke with a young boy from the team. He said the children tried to include their coach in their impromptu game. No one spoke back to him or ignored him. It was as if they simply decided to hold their own practice rather than follow the coach's plan."

"Did the boy remember what he was thinking at the time? Or feeling?"

"That he wasn't worried." H.G. looked at Steve. "He didn't feel worried about the coach's reaction. He said normally they run the length of the gym when they aren't listening, but at the practices held here, that didn't matter. The coach can't make them run here." She crossed her arms. "So strange. What were the other incidences?"

"Um, some gardening and crafting classes, a youth group party," Steve listed, "that town meeting back there. Nobody was listening to each other in there."

"Nobody was listening to the mayor," H.G. said. "Nor us. Few people were willing to be open with us."

"To be fair, we normally have trouble getting answers from people."

"It's something to do with authority, not simply inciting a rebellion in people. It's more complicated than that." H.G. started pacing along the wall, back to studying it intently. Steve looked over the bricks again too. Some had writing on them: names and dates, short sayings. Others weren't bricks at all, but sections of concrete with handprints and more names. It looked like most of the town had left their mark on the wall. It was a neat thing to do for a community center, but Steve still didn't see a sign of the artifact.

"How are we supposed to find an artifact in a wall?" he asked. "Assuming it is in the wall."

"I don't think it is in the wall," H.G. said. "I think the artifact /is/ the wall."

"What?"

H.G. tugged on a pair of the purple gloves and approached a section of the wall. She reached out and ran a finger along a row of bricks. Steve had to step in closer to see the reaction, but there were definitely faint sparks generated by the contact.

"Holy... the whole wall is an artifact?" But.. it wasn't like Jericho's wall or something. How could it be an artifact? "It's just a regular wall."

"They made it." Steve noticed H.G. was smiling. "This town made a brand new artifact. How amazing is that?" She let out a laugh.

Steve recalled an earlier interview. "They made all the bricks the same day. All the writings and handprints and drawings, they did them all during one big town gathering before installing them." The woman who'd told him about it had been really proud of that day.

"Something about the camaraderie, the sense of community," H.G. said. "It infused itself in the bricks."

"And made them all stop listening to authority figures?"

"Equals," H.G. said. She still gazed in wonder at the wall. "There are no authority figures. They're all equals."

"Must not affect the authority figures." Steve glanced from one end of the room to the other. He judged the wall to be about 100 feet long in total after it wrapped around. "We definitely can't take this back to the warehouse."

"No, we cannot."

Artie wasn't going to like that. "So how do we neutralize it?"

H.G. met his look. "I think it's time we call Claudia."

////////////////////////////////

Claudia was ecstatic.

"It's a wall? Like a whole entire wall? That's so cool! Why do you get the cool artifacts when my last snag sprayed mud?"

"I don't know, I thought mud was a good look for you."

"Ha ha."

"Claudia, we obviously can't bring the artifact with us," H.G. said. "So I thought we could set up a way to neutralize it here."

"Whatcha thinking, some kind of shield? A constant goo shower?" Claudia scrunched her nose. "Ugh, no, that'd be a mess."

"How does the Ovoid Quarantine work? Or the Dark Vault? In order to provide extra protection against the artifacts."

"Kind of a mix of things. There's the special light bulbs that kind of do a halo effect around the artifacts. There's some energy balancing that Leena used to maintain. Then the Ovoid also has these drapes that don't necessarily neutralize the artifacts so much as shield the artifact energies from the rest of the warehouse."

Steve's eyes flicked up to the wall. "I don't think we can hang drapes in here without ticking off the town."

"We need something smaller," H.G. said. "Something like a border we could run around the perimeter that would neutralize the wall's effects."

Claudia heaved a deep breath. "Border, border," she mumbled, tapping her hand on the desk. "What if we mixed the goo with regular caulking and, I don't know, filled in around the wall? Would that work?"

H.G. had already moved back to the wall and was standing on tiptoes to examine the top of the memorial section. Then, she walked down to the start of the section and examined the side. She looked up and nodded at Steve. "If three sides are enough, it should work."

////////////

Claudia caught a last minute flight to bring them more neutralizing goo, and the three of them spent the night mixing the caulk and running a line of it along the sides and tops of the memorial wall. There wasn't really anything to seal up and the townspeople might complain, but they'd managed to convince the mayor it would solve their issues. Of course, they weren't entirely convinced themselves the plan would work until they'd finished and H.G. successfully ran the glove over the wall without raising any sparks.

"Hello, hello! Your future boss is back!" Claudia declared as they walked into the warehouse office. "Along with the two slacker agents I had to go bail out." There was a muffled crash of papers somewhere, and Steve raised an eyebrow. Was the records room finally giving up and succumbing to its disorganized state.

"You know I called you for a consult," H.G. said. Claudia spun on her toes wearing a big, pleased grin.

"I know." She squealed as she spun back around and darted to her computer on the desk.

"She's going to go write it down in her diary now," Steve told H.G.

"Hush, you!"

"Well, at least she isn't nervous around me anymore." Of course Claudia had been nervous around the famous H.G. Wells during H.G's first reinstatement. He kind of wish he'd known everyone back then. He'd only came in to the warehouse a couple years after Claudia, yet it sometimes felt like he'd missed out on a lot with the team.

Myka popped out of the records room, with her hair surprisingly pulled back and all around looking a little flustered.

"Hi," she smiled. "Hey, welcome back. How was Oregon?"

"Pretty good," Steve said. "The glimpse of fresh air was nice."

Myka nodded. "And the case went well?" She was looking at H.G. as she asked, so it was H.G. who answered.

"It went very smoothly."

Steve smiled, thinking the successful snag (well, containment) would ease the tension over H.G. returning to the field.

"Good. Good, that's good."

That didn't feel less tense.

"Well, I think I'll start in on the report for this one," H.G. said. "Not much point in putting it off until later." She took a blank form from the table and carried it with the case file into the side room. Myka's eyes followed her the whole way. Steve frowned.

"Were you trying to sort out the records room?" Claudia asked. Myka jumped.

"Um, yeah. Well, trying being the operative word there."

Claudia gestured at her face. "Did ya take a dust mask in? You could die of mites in there."

"It wasn't that bad," Myka said. She pointed her thumb at the room. "I started tagging old case files with meta tags," - Claudia perked up - "that I think could be useful when you start digitizing the records."

"Intrigue." Claudia shuffled off to the records room to check out Myka's work. Myka returned to staring at the side room where H.G. was. If he was going to ask, Myka would be the one to give him a solid answer.

"Can you maybe explain where all the concern over H.G. is coming from? Because she did fine on the case. I mean she did great. She figured out the town had created a new artifact. I don't really understand why everyone's so worried."

Myka flipped her stare back to him. "Did she even sleep at all?"

"What?" Okay, no one had asked him about H.G's sleeping habits yet. "Um, maybe? I don't know. We each took turns driving back. I definitely slept some."

Myka stared again at the side room. "I don't think she's sleeping much."

He was distinctly uncomfortable. He didn't really discuss concerns over personal habits with anyone on the team (unless it was Pete chewing with his mouth open), and he really didn't think he knew H.G. well enough to discuss her sleeping patterns with Myka.

But Myka looked really worried.

"Should you maybe go talk to her?"

Myka looked surprised. "I.. I do talk to her."

"I don't know," Steve said. "You just seem pretty worried. And you'd probably do better talking to H.G. about that instead of me."

"Yeah." Myka had her arms crossed and looked like she held herself tighter now. "I just..." she shook her head. "I just don't want her to leave again."

"So, you're going to go talk to her?" Myka still hesitated so he added, "Hey what if Pete hadn't talked to you after you came back?"

"Are you kidding me? He didn't. He really avoided talking to me until I made him." Steve tilted his head to make the point. Myka pursed her lips and twisted her neck like she didn't want to admit he was right. Finally, she huffed.

"Yeah, fine. Pete told me the same thing. I mean, not..everything, just that I should talk to her." She sighed again. "Okay, I'm going." She walked off into the side room, just as Claudia emerged from the records room.

"Oh my god, I want to make out with these tags and have little meta tag babies. They're so gorgeous!" She looked up from the files she held and looked around. "Where'd she go? I must gush."

"To talk to H.G." Steve said.

"Oh, cool. Dude, she tagged everything! Artifact, location, each of the agents, year, era of the artifact, relevant historical events." Claudia's eyes were huge with excitement as she rambled. "This shit could rival Netflix. It's incredibly thorough."

"Did you expect anything less from Myka?"

Claudia nodded in agreement.

"Hey, I have a question," Steve said. "Were Myka and H.G. partners back when H.G. was first here? I always thought Myka was Pete's partner, but the way she's been acting with H.G. is confusing me."

Claudia shrugged and shook her head. "H.G. wasn't really around long enough last time to get a regular partner." She switched to a stern look. "That doesn't mean she's up for grabs. You are not getting a new partner. This was a special arrangement, not permanent. I do still own you, you know."

"Hey, the metronome link is broken now."

"And yet, you're still alive. Ergo, I still own you. Ha!" She walked off to put the files back in the records room.

"Yeah, about that." Steve followed after her. He'd decided he did want that t-shirt after all.

**Author's Note:**

> A million apologies because this fic is largely unedited and I'm incredibly new to writing proper artifact retrievals. :/ I wound up not being comfortable writing about any holidays directly, but the artifact was inspired by the Saturnalia tradition of letting the slaves speak freely without fear of repercussions. (At least it was a tradition according to the Saturnalia Wikipedia entry. I'm not an expert by any means.) Honestly, I just hope this wasn't terrible. I worked with a lot of new elements in this piece, so it was at least a good learning experience.


End file.
